MCLAREN ARTURA

BETTER LATE THAN NEVER. McLAREN’S Artura, the company’s first step into its second decade, was down to compete in eCoty 2021, but a cancelled launch in October of that year meant we had to wait until April 2022 before we could drive it and until the first day of this test before getting a second bite.

It impressed Jethro Bovingdon on its launch, delivering the McLaren trademarks of peerless ergonomics, impeccable ride quality and near unbeatable steering, but it also still betrayed some other, less desirable McLaren characteristics, such as malfunctioning systems and the small matter of catching fire. Steve Sutcliffe got away more lightly with his launch car, which suffered from failed air conditioning during a Spanish heatwave.

But as new CEO Michael Leiters explained to evo last month, the Artura wasn’t ready earlier this year, which is why he stopped production and deliveries until it was. The car Dickie Meaden has driven to our eCoty HQ is behaving impeccably, looks sensational covered in an early autumn morning dew on day one and feels up for the challenge that lies ahead.

Like the Ferrari 296 (opposite) it finds itself in a test within a test, but it also has more to prove individually than other cars here due to its protracted and much publicised launch failings. But when McLaren gets it right, few can match its cars when it comes to mixing performance, engagement and a sense of being in a machine designed to do a specific task better than it has any right to. Betting against the Artura would be a risk even among such strong company as can be found at this year’s eCoty.

MARANELLO TOOK LAST YEAR’S BOTTOM‑OF‑ the-table eCoty result for the SF90 Stradale with remarkable good grace and outstanding professionalism. They asked questions, of course they did. Lots of them covering every detail of our week-long test. The black listing never came and the conversation continues to flow between evo and Ferrari each time we drive one its cars.

It was the first to confirm its entry for this year’s test, eager to understand and plan for where we were heading and what we intended to do. Even when we had to change our test location from continental Europe to the north of England the same car was still made available. No last-minute changes or tweaks, only a request for the new delivery address. Ferrari still oozes confidence.

With good reason. Adam Towler, a man not easily swayed by power outputs or hyperbole, was blown away by the 296 GTB’s capability on the car’s launch, his initial messages back from that event suggesting he had driven 2022’s eCoty winner. Jethro was equally impressed when Ferrari insisted he drive it before he attended McLaren’s launch of the Artura. There was a strong feeling Ferrari had a contender on its hands.

It is up against the strongest field of its type we’ve seen in an eCoty. The 296 not only has McLaren’s hybrid-V6 supercar to contend with, but also Maserati’s V6-turbo MC20 and Audi’s R8 Performance RWD and its mega V10.

The most powerful car in our test, the most expensive too, the 296 GTB arrives with great expectation (as every Ferrari does), but also a quiet confidence that suggests it should more than live up to its billing.

‘NOTHING CAN PREPARE YOU FOR HOW POTENT THE 296 FEELS WHEN IT’S UNLEASHED’ – ADAM TOWLER

MAGAZINE SCHEDULES, MANUFACTURER embargoes, global supply chain issues and postpandemic travel restrictions make for some frustrating circumstances, especially so when it meant that within days of returning from eCoty 2021 we found ourselves in the Italian hills driving a Maserati MC20 for the first time.

“This would have wiped the floor last week,” said Jethro to the 2021 eCoty WhatsApp group. “Still, it means we don’t have to bother with next year’s test, Stu, we can spend on the budget on 996 parts instead.”

Such optimism in a car so far ahead of its eCoty appearance can backfire spectacularly. New cars continue to come along, stronger opposition, unexpected new heroes all making a case for themselves as the months roll by. The MC20 wouldn’t be able to take it easy.

Alongside the optimism there is considerable baggage. Maserati has been absent from eCoty for nearly 15 years and it’s hardly been at the forefront of the enthusiast’s mind in the interim. There have been a few highlights, such as the Ghibli and Quattroporte Trofeo, yet many lowlights too. But that was yesterday and Maserati’s tomorrow starts with the MC20. It’s sleek, with an unapologetic supercar look and feel matched with a turbocharged V6 that ignores any form of hybridisation, adding an appeal that will result in a fight for the keys from day one of the test.

But, and this is perhaps the biggest point of all, Maserati hasn’t produced a mid-engined supercar it can call its own since the Bora over 40 years ago. Its legacy and experience in this space is virtually non-existent; it makes McLaren look like a seasoned pro, Audi a historical master and Ferrari… well, Ferrari is Ferrari.

The MC20 arrives with huge amounts of goodwill behind it, but an even heavier weight of expectation hanging over it.

‘ITS UNIQUE ABILITY TO BLEND ACROBATIC POISE WITH A VENOMOUS ENGINE IS FASCINATING’ – JETHRO BOVINGDON

YOU CAN SPEND MORE ON OPTIONAL EXTRAS on some of this year's contenders than it costs to buy a Toyota GR86 outright (although the UK’s allocation of under 500 cars sold out as quickly as the latest Porsche RS model), yet its place at eCoty 2022 is entirely justified.

Its formula is one that many manufacturers claim can’t be made to work in today’s world as they look for excuses to move away from cars people desire to those that suit a PR friendly mantra. ‘No one wants affordable performance cars!’ they cry. Toyota simply laughs at them.

What looks to be a heavily revised GT86 is in fact a thoroughly transformed car. A larger capacity flat-four, more power and torque as required rather than for the sake of it, an improved gearshift and a myriad of detail chassis changes – from increasing the wheelbase length by 5mm to reducing the centre of gravity by the same amount – have created not only one of the best affordable sports cars we’ve driven for a long, long time but one of the best driver’s cars period. Its inclusion was never in doubt regardless of the exotica that’s been launched over the last twelve months.

From the moment we drove a prototype at the end of 2021 to the car’s launch at the beginning of 2022’s long hot summer, the GR86 has impressed not because of its price point alone but because it shows that, like the very best hot hatches from Ford Performance and Hyundai N (and Renault Sport in the past), quality engineering and dynamics don’t have to be the sole domain of the premium marques that set social media alight. Toyota could charge 50 per cent more for the GR86 and it would still be worth every penny. That’s how good it is.

Good enough to take on the world’s top supercar brands, the might of AMG, the resources of Audi Sport and the heritage of BMW M and Porsche’s GT department? Don’t bet against it.

‘THE GR86 IS QUITE SIMPLY ONE OF THE GREATEST SPORTS CARS OF THE CURRENT ERA’ – STEVE SUTCLIFFE

IN 2020 THE BMW M2 CS ARRIVED WITH THE on-paper credentials of an eCoty podium finisher, and after a quiet week on track it delivered the killer blows to its rivals on the road. It was a driver’s car that ticked so many boxes it’s hard to imagine some thought it would fall short. Surely the M5 CS twelve months later wouldn’t fare so strongly, would it?

Bigger, heavier, from stock that has impressed rather than enthralled, the M5 CS was an outlier that knocked the competition for six. No pressure M4 CSL, but BMW M is eying up a hat-trick.

Its confidence is well placed. The CSL is the ultimate take on today’s M4, a car that has continued M’s return to form and won as many people over for how it drives as it has offended on the internet for how it looks. The CSL ups the ante and turns the screw harder still.

But applying the CSL name to a BMW road car sets hopes exceptionally high, meaning the lightest, most focused, most driver-orientated current M car arrives with nowhere to hide. Our initial drive in issue 303 found a good car desperately wanting to prove it was a great one, but it left Jethro feeling that experiencing that last ten per cent was a judgement call as to whether the reward was worth the risk.

A week in the hands of the wider eCoty panel and across more varied roads will be the CSL’s best chance to prove if it is not just an outstanding M car but one of best new cars, possibly even the best, we have driven in 2022.

‘THE WAY IT CAN BE TEASED ON AND AROUND THE LIMIT IS A TIME-HONOURED M DIVISION TRAIT’ – JETHRO BOVINGDON

PORSCHE APPEARS TO HAVE TURNED UP to a World War I dogfight with a Eurofighter. This is the Cayman that has been talked about, rumoured and denied would ever happen since Porsche revealed its mid-engined two-seater back in 2005. Since then the original GT4 has demonstrated the Cayman’s potential by being crowned 2015’s eCoty champ, an honour its successor repeated in 2019. But the RS? This is hardcore with a capital ‘H’.

The baggage it’s saddled with is oversized, the expectation it carries almost suffocating. The appetite for it to be the best driver’s car ever made? Insatiable. It makes a GT3 feel almost undercooked, its specification as mouth-watering as it is intimidating. Those who have driven it know what’s to come, their anticipation matched by the sense of excitement from those of us yet to experience a fully blown Porsche Motorsportdeveloped Cayman.

There’s a quiet confidence oozing from the GT4 RS, as there always is from Porsches on eCoty. The promise of its ethos – ‘the car you are as likely to take for a road drive as you are a track blast’ according to its maker – is almost overwhelming. It’s a car that has blown minds on its own and held its own against more titled icons both past and present.

This week it will need more than its laser-sharp focus, though. The Cayman GT4 RS will need to demonstrate it’s more than a track refugee and can live up to the claims that it’s from the useable side of the RS workshop. Like many in this test it has been created by a team that understands exactly what’s required to win this automotive dogfight.

‘IT’S NEVER SLEEPING, IT’S ALWAYS “ON”, UNAPOLOGETICALLY, UNAMBIGUOUSLY’ – ADAM TOWLER

MERCEDES’ SL IS NO NEWCOMER TO ECOTY. It’s appeared in a couple of iterations over the decades and while it’s never troubled the podium, each has been admired by many and desired by a few. An all-new SL designed and developed by AMG rather than Mercedes could buck that trend and see the roadster become a challenger for the first time.

On paper it certainly appears to have what that goal would require, including an aluminium chassis into which is installed Mercedes’ latest adaptive four-wheeldrive system, air-suspension, every conceivable driver aid and a 4-litre, twin-turbocharged V8. The range-topping 577bhp SL63 hadn’t arrived by the time eCoty took place, but the SL55’s 469bhp version of AMG’s twinturbocharged V8 should be plenty in a car that’s as much

GT as it is a hot rod.

Speaking of which, the SL has the toughest assignment here as it is the only car among our contenders that serves a dual role. But while no one is expecting it to be as cutting edge and focused as others in the test, its broader remit and different approach could give it the advantage required to rise above its more extreme competitors here.

We have also thrown the new SL in at the deep end. This is the first time we have had access to the car since its December 2021 launch, so it arrives as a complete unknown to every judge. Yet while this means the SL55 has more to prove during this test, it also comes from a company with more resources than any of its rivals here bar Toyota, so it should hit the ground running.

‘AMG’S INPUT IS CLEAR FROM THE MOMENT YOU APPROACH IT. IT BROODS WITH CONFIDENCE FROM EVERY ANGLE’ – STUART GALLAGHER